This blog is about the book 'CONFIDENTIAL: The Life of Secret Agent Turned Hollywood Tycoon Arnon Milchan.' The biography of a legendary Hollywood producer.
Cover image: Milchan embraces Arafat. A James Bond fan, Arafat thought he was embracing a film producer who had just introduced him to one of the original Bond's, Sean Connery. Arafat never realized he was schmoozing a top Israeli intelligence asset. - SCROLL DOWN:

When asked recently by The Malibu Times if the book was accurate, he said, “They got 70% right and about 70% of what I did is not in there … I’ll do anything for Israel.” Co author of Confidential, Joseph Gelman, responded to Mr. Milchan's comment:

We would like to congratulate Mr. Arnon Milchan as the 2015 honoree of the Malibu Film Society. An excellent choice and a well-deserved honor indeed.As for Mr. Milchan's comments about the accuracy of our biography of him:Mr. Milchan states that about 70% of his activities were not mentioned in our book. That is entirely possible. Mr. Milchan was one of the most important and productive secret agents that Israeli intelligence had ever fielded at the time (the 1960-1980's), a very active period. As biographers, for the sake of our own credibility, we were careful to include only material that we felt we could substantiate, and that material was stunning enough, as evidence by the strong media reaction to its publication. Our material was, and is, more than enough to give the reader an accurate overall picture with plenty of jaw-dropping details.There were numerous operations that we became aware of but did not include in our book either for lack of sufficient confirmation, or because we felt that people may actually be physically endangered by the publishing of such information. We also have no doubt that there were operations that we are unaware of. Mr. Milchan did not volunteer the details. We never claimed to have published every detail, we published what was the product of years of serious research and off-the-record interviews with key players, including President Shomon Peres, who personally recruited Mr. Milchan in the 1960's.We believe that what is in the book is accurate, both in spirit and in fact. We did the best we could given the sensitive and deeply confidential nature of the material. In the years since its publication, Mr. Milchan has never challenged the accuracy of a single element. In fact, he has confirmed most of it in a top-rated, hour-long documentary by Israel's leading news program that was largely based on our book. We not only stand by our material, we believe that the assertions we make in our book were actually understated, as hinted, perhaps unintentionally, by Mr. Milchan himself in his comments to the Malibu Times.Mr. Milchan was a genuine James Bond / Jason Bourne type figure, whose pre-Hollywood life is worthy of a movie or action-suspense series itself. We wish him the best, and congratulate the Malibu Film Society for an excellent and well deserving choice for an honoree. Mr. Milchan is in fact one of the most successful and prolific producers in the history of Hollywood. Again, we stand by our material.

NBC News on 'Confidential': "A movie tycoon whose life story itself is a Hollywood movie"

Media Contact Information

July 17, 2011: The New York Times Introduces 'Confidential' to the World: GROUND BREAKING.

Click on image for the full article.

Fox News: "This is a Deadly Serious Book"

Fox News and the New York Times agree on something. Click on the image for the full backstory to the writing of the book 'Confidential' as published by FoxNews.com

Fox News on the 'Confidential' story: "This is a Movie in Itself"

Additional recommended reading:

For a wider understanding of Israel's intelligence services beyond the story of one facinating man, the authors of 'Confidential' also recommend Dan Raviv and Yossi Melman's gripping book 'Spies Against Armageddon'. Click on the image to go to their Amazon page.

CNN on the 'Confidential' story: "Hollywood Execs Will Be Fighting to Get This to The Big Screen"

The Daily Beast on Confidential - The Downfall of a Top Aerospace Scientist

GUT WRENCHING: Arnon and Richard Kelly Smyth go shopping for nuke materials. Smyth is caught...escapes... and 16 years of fear and exile ensue. Click on image for the story.

'Confidential' Co-author Doron Interviews for CBS News:

Author-Signed & Personalized Copies of Confidential Available Only Here:

Contact the Authors of 'Confidential' at 202-440-3050.

Tablet Magazine: The Shocking Milchan-South African Saga

He may have produced '12 Years a Slave' as a measure of redemption, but before that he played a key, controversial and highly secret role in Aparthide South Africa. Click on image for the exclusive details.

Sky News: Arnon Milchan wishes he hadn't denied it.

Milchan's Spymaster Blumberg: "For years I carried a cyanide capsule in case I was caught"

The only known photo of Arnon Milchan's Israeli Intelligence Handler and Trainer (between 1965-1981), LAKAM Chief and Master Spy Benjamin Blumberg. "Milchan was a man I could work with". Click Image for the full story.

Richard (AKA Dr. Jon Schiller) and Emily Smyth, The Owners of 'Milco', a LAKAM Front Company

The fugitive couple who escaped to 16 years of exile in Malaga, Spain, after shipping nuclear weapons triggers (Krytrons) to their long-time business partner/LAKAM handler, Arnon Milchan. Smyth, who was caught, extradited and convicted in the case, blames Arnon Milchan for destroying his life. Click on image for the story.

Krytron - a nuclear trigger

Like in any movie production "It's always the little things that cause the most trouble" - Arnon Milchan

Urenco Nuclear Centrifuge Blueprints...

In the dead of night, Arnon Milchan secured the designs for advanced centrifuges for uranium enrichment... click on image for details:

A Fall From Grace - The Smyth mobile home

Once he was one of the most important and respected aerospace engineers in America with a waterfront mansion and a yacht. Today he lives in a little mobile home next to the railroad tracks in Lompoc, CA. Photo by Joseph Gelman. The Authors visited Mr. Smyth at his home as part of the investigative process.

Jonathan Pollard - Also a LAKAM Operative, and also handled by Rafi Eitan in 1985....

Arrested only months after Richard Kelly Smyth fled into exile in 1985 to live as a fugitive on the lam. The Smyth incident/disappearance undoubtedly played a negative role in Pollard's disproportionately harsh treatment... as US authorities were looking at that point to "send a message". Few have understood the connection between the Smyth and Pollard cases, and the time-frame. Pollard still rots in Jail, going on 29 years now.

Top Mossad operative and LAKAM Chief who was forced to resign following the Pollard Affair. Years earlier, Rafi Eitan had personally captured Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann. Eitan enjoys sculpting, and one of his sculptures sits in his friend Milchan's living room in his Malibu ocean-front mansion. Click Image for background on Rafi Eitan.

Arnon Milchan's $600,000,000 Art Collection

A less valuable sculpture by his friend Rafi Eitan sits on the living room table.

Arnon Milchan, Moshe Dayan and Leon Uris, the Author of Exodus.

It was Arnon Milchan who brokered the deal between Shimon Peres and Ariel Sharon to create the Kadima Party

Arnon Milchan and French President Jacques Chirac

Standing alongside Milchan with blond short hair is Ase Thastrom, Milchan's former longtime lover who still lives in his Chateau in France, next door to the retired French President.

Peres, Milchan, Netanyahu

The Man in the Middle...in more ways than one

Arnon Milchan, Roman Polanski and Robert De Niro behind a 'Solidarity' sign in Poland

Milchan financed a production of 'Amadeus', the first Western cultural event held in Poland since before WWII. Polanski himself played the lead role. With the fall of Communisim in Poland, President Lech Walesa invited the trio for a Robert De Niro film festival that they organized.

Martin Scorsese directs Jerry Lewis in the 'King of Comedy' As Arnon Milchan looks on

Every Tabloid on the Planet Picks up on the Brad Pitt-Angelina Jolie 'Confidential' Scoop

The Authors didn't even consider it 'news' when Milchan described to them the behind-the-scenes story of the beginning of Angelina and Brad's relationship, and the break-up with Jennifer Aniston. Apperently the tabloids considered it huge news.

Arnon Milchan and Angelina Jolie

The Secrets of the 'Secret Agents' of Mr. and Mrs. Smith

The Authors of 'Confidential', Meir Doron and Joseph Gelman

Top-notch Investigative Journalism of the 'old school' kind. The stunning Investigation that brought a super-agent in from the cold.